Democratic National Committee – Hot Airhttp://hotair.com
The world’s first, full-service conservative Internet broadcast networkSat, 10 Dec 2016 01:41:13 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.6.116302432Keith Ellison: I’ll resign my seat if I win the election for DNC chairhttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/12/07/keith-ellison-ill-resign-my-seat-if-i-win-the-election-for-dnc-chair/
Wed, 07 Dec 2016 18:01:22 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3934936Keith Ellison announced Wednesday that he would resign his seat in Congress if he wins the race for the chairmanship of the Democratic National Committee. Politico reports Ellison released a statement which said, “In order to further their commitment and maximize my effectiveness, I have decided to resign as a member of Congress if I win the election for DNC chair.”

“Since I threw my hat in the ring a few weeks ago for the Chair of the Democratic National Committee, I have had the privilege, pleasure, and benefit of listening to a great many party activists, including folks with long years of service and those brand new to the party. I have learned one thing: Democrats are ready for a massive comeback,” he said in a statement. “Whoever wins the DNC chair race faces a lot of work, travel, planning and resource raising. I will be ‘all-in’ to meet the challenge.”

Last month Ellison suggested he had enough energy to retain his seat in Congress and take on the DNC job. However, Democrats who are feeling disappointed with the work of previous chair Debbie Wasserman-Schultz have decided they want a full-time commitment to the job.

When Howard Dean, seen as Ellison’s strongest challenger for the position, announced he was dropping out of the race last week he also said whoever took the job must be there full-time. Ellison, who spoke at the same gathering of Democrats a few hours later, told the crowd, “I’m in the process of deciding this issue of whether I can perform both roles.” However, he also downplayed the time commitment of his job as congressman saying, “All there is to do is to vote ‘no’.”

As with the Democrats’ choice of Nancy Pelosi to continue in her role as House Minority Leader, the elevation of Keith Ellison to DNC chair may be a blessing in disguise for the GOP. Alan Dershowitz made that case on Fox News this morning saying, “The Democrats lost this election not because they didn’t get the radical or left-wing voters but because they didn’t get the middle-American, the rust-belt, white working families.” He continued, “Now they’re appointing somebody who has for years associated himself with Farrakhan. Who hates America. Who hates white people. Who hates Jews.” “If I were a Republican strategist I would be jumping for joy. ‘My god, you’re going to pick Ellision to head the Democratic Party?!’,” Dershowitz said.

]]>3934936Video: Outgoing Baltimore Mayor has few regrets, may seek a career in televisionhttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/12/06/video-outgoing-baltimore-mayor-has-few-regrets-may-seek-a-career-in-television/
Tue, 06 Dec 2016 19:31:50 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3934711In a few weeks the residents of Baltimore, Maryland will finally see the end of the tenure of Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake. Having chosen not to run for another term (wisely, by most accounts) she will be replaced by Catherine Pugh. In what’s being billed as her final interview as Mayor, she sat down for a thankfully short chat on the local news show, Square Off with Richard Sher. You can watch the interview here. I’m not even attempting to embed it since it defaults to auto-play.

Just to give you an idea of the “tough questions” she faced, this is literally the first hardball pitched her way:

You’ve become a celebrity… the question is, what’s next for you? You could be on television. You could be an actress, a model, you could run for political office again…. What’s up for you?

With the tone for the interview set, let’s get to a couple of the highlights.

On her plans for the future.

The Mayor is not planning to run for any office other than reelection as Secretary for the DNC. She expressed how “important” that work is and how much she enjoys it.

Is there any truth to the rumor she will be working “on television?”

She responds by saying, “I’ll just say that I’ve been approached.” She goes on to discuss how much she really enjoys being on TV.

Does she have any advice for the next mayor?

She advises Pugh to trust her gut instincts and what got her there.

Is it just me, or are there a few things missing from this interview? I don’t think anyone is being fooled into believing that Rawlings-Blake took a pass on this election because she was bored or was preparing for bigger things. This is a mayor who had the honor of presiding over Charm City when it nearly burned to the ground. She oversaw a foolish and expensive series of trials against her own police officers, all of which ended in dismissals until the entire project was abandoned. The deteriorating relationship between City Hall and the police may have contributed to the fact that her tenure included crime figures in 2015 which pegged out at 344 murders… a rate not seen since the 80s. This year was slightly better so far, with a tally of 296, but there’s still a few weeks to go.

That record should be kept in mind when we consider the fact that the mayor is currently the Secretary of the Democratic National Committee, a position she’s widely expected to keep for another term. I suppose that counts as success in some circles. The Baltimore Sun just published a laundry list of unresolved issues which the new mayor is going to have to tackle once Rawlings-Blake exits stage left.

Baltimore is far more of a war zone than it was when this mayor arrived. How she is being lauded on the way out the door and courted with television gigs and a prominent position at the DNC is a mystery for the ages.

]]>3934711Keith Ellison on his job as congressman: ‘All there is to do is to vote no’http://hotair.com/archives/2016/12/03/keith-ellison-on-his-job-as-congressman-all-there-is-to-do-is-to-vote-no/
Sat, 03 Dec 2016 22:31:31 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3934361Keith Ellison argued Friday at a gathering of Democrats that he could take over as chairman of the Democratic National Committee and keep his job in congress because, “All there is to do is to vote ‘no’.”

The Friday gathering in Denver was viewed as a try out for the various contenders for the DNC post being vacated by interim chairwoman Donna Brazile. Appearing by video, Howard Dean made a surprise announcement that he would no longer be seeking the DNC chairmanship. That was good news for Ellison who is considered the leading contender for the job. However, one thing Howard Dean did not retract Friday even as he took himself out of the race was that whoever took over must approach the DNC as a full-time job. In other words, the party should not select Ellison who already has a full-time job as a congressman.

Ellison appeared at the same event a couple hours later and made his own surprise announcement. The NY Times reports Ellison said, “I’m in the process of deciding this issue of whether I can perform both roles.” But even as he expressed his willingness to consider stepping down from his seat in Congress, Ellison also tried to downplay the time his job in Congress would take saying, “All there is to do is to vote ‘no’.”

Democrats have spent years pointing to a comment Mitch McConnell made about insuring President Obama would remain a one-term president. McConnell actually made that comment in late 2010 as the 2012 election was heating up, but it has mistakenly been pointed to, including by Obama himself, as proof that Republicans never gave Obama a chance. This comment by Keith Ellison ought to get the same level of attention coming as it does before President-elect Trump has even been sworn into office.

When Ellison tried to suggest to the audience of Democrats that previous DNC leaders had held both jobs at once he was mocked. From the NY Times:

After Mr. Ellison pointed out that other elected officials, most recently Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida, had held the post while serving in office, [Jaime] Harrison responded with barely veiled mockery.

“‘Debbie did it,’” Mr. Harrison said to scattered laughs and groans. “I’ll leave that up to you guys to make that determination.”

“No, she didn’t!” Bob Mulholland, a California committee member, shouted from the back of the room.

Ouch! If you had any lingering doubts why Democrats don’t want a part-time DNC chair, this exchange makes it pretty clear what their reasoning is.

Having Dean drop out of the race was good news for Ellison, but this week the congressman also faced some tough headwinds over his past statements about Israel. The Anti-Defamation League announced Thursday that newly uncovered comments Ellison had made about Israel in 2010 were “disqualifying.” Ellison wrote an open letter to the ADL in response claiming he’d been taken out of context but the damage was already done.

Ellison is also still contending with his past as a compatriot and defender of Louis Farrakhan. On that front, Ellison wrote an apology of sorts for the Washington Post Thursday.

In my effort to pursue justice for the African American community, I neglected to scrutinize the words of those such as Khalid Muhammad and Farrakhan who mixed a message of African American empowerment with scapegoating of other communities. These men organize by sowing hatred and division, including anti-Semitism, homophobia and a chauvinistic model of manhood. I disavowed them long ago, condemned their views and apologized.

It’s amazingly easy for Democrats who have cozied up to some of the most extreme voices on the left to distance themselves when they feel ready to do so.

]]>3934361Howard Dean drops out of DNC chairman race to avoid divisivenesshttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/12/02/howard-dean-drops-out-of-dnc-chairman-race-says-he-decided-weeks-ago/
Sat, 03 Dec 2016 00:21:37 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3934277Howard Dean announced Friday that he was withdrawing from the race to succeed interim DNC chairwoman Donna Brazile. Appearing by video at a DNC forum in Denver, Dean said, “I think it could possibly be divisive. I have other priorities. I have a grandchild now. But I am fully dedicated to using as much time as I can to support whoever the chairman is.”

Shortly after his announcement, Dean appeared on MSNBC to discuss his decision. “I really feel strongly that our party needs to turn itself over to the next generation and I’m very happy to stay in the background and help coach whoever the chair is,” Dean said. He added, “I just think that one of the problems that we had in this election is that we’ve got to connect more with young people and that means not having faces like mine.”

Pressed on what had changed in his thinking from a few days ago when he was still in the race, Dean made the curious claim that he had made the decision weeks ago. “I made this decision two or three weeks ago,” Dean said. However, Dean only joined the race just over three weeks ago on November 11th, tweeting at the time:

The dems need organization and focus on the young. Need a fifty State strategy and tech rehab. I am in for chairman again.

Even if Dean made the decision two weeks ago that means a) he was only really in the race for 8 days and b) he waited two weeks to let anyone know he had decided to drop out. Something else must have happened here but Dean isn’t saying what that is.

Dean did expand on his point about divisiveness saying he wanted to avoid the race for chairman becoming a Hillary vs. Bernie proxy fight. “Once I was in I got a quick lay of the land, I think that I would have and could have won just because of what we were able to accomplish the last time I was chair,” Dean said. He added, “It became clear to me that, one, if we weren’t really careful this would be a Hillary versus Bernie proxy fight. I was for Hillary. Keith Ellison, who is one of the people who is running, was for Bernie. I didn’t want that fight.” Secondly, Dean said again he felt it was better to have young people running.

Dean said he might make an endorsement at some point but did not seem ready to endorse Ellison as the leading contender. On the contrary, Dean continued to maintain that whoever gets the job should be working at the DNC full time. That would obviously exclude Ellison who already has a full time job as a congressman. Here’s Dean’s appearance on MSNBC:

]]>3934277ADL: Newly uncovered remarks by Keith Ellison are ‘disturbing and disqualifying’http://hotair.com/archives/2016/12/01/adl-says-keith-ellison-remarks-are-disqualifying/
Thu, 01 Dec 2016 23:01:18 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3934131The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) says it has new doubts about Keith Ellison as the next chairman of the Democratic National Party. In a press release published Thursday the ADL cited new information in the form of a 2010 speech in which Ellison said United States foreign policy was based on what was good or bad for Israel:

New information recently has come to light that raises serious concerns about whether Rep. Ellison faithfully could represent the Democratic Party’s traditional support for a strong and secure Israel. In a speech recorded in 2010 to a group of supporters, Rep. Ellison is heard suggesting that American foreign policy in the Middle East is driven by Israel, saying: “The United States foreign policy in the Middle East is governed by what is good or bad through a country of 7 million people. A region of 350 million all turns on a country of 7 million. Does that make sense? Is that logic? Right? When the Americans who trace their roots back to those 350 million get involved, everything changes.”

Rep. Ellison’s remarks are both deeply disturbing and disqualifying. His words imply that U.S. foreign policy is based on religiously or national origin-based special interests rather than simply on America’s best interests. Additionally, whether intentional or not, his words raise the specter of age-old stereotypes about Jewish control of our government, a poisonous myth that may persist in parts of the world where intolerance thrives, but that has no place in open societies like the U.S. These comments sharply contrast with the Democratic National Committee platform position, which states: “A strong and secure Israel is vital to the United States because we share overarching strategic interests and the common values of democracy, equality, tolerance, and pluralism.”

Previously, the ADL had defended Ellison as a “man of good character” though the group’s CEO also said it had some concerns about some of his positions.

Ellison’s newly uncovered remarks were published Tuesday by the Investigative Project on Terrorism. IPT’s Steven Emerson wrote, “In a fairly intimate setting, Ellison lashed out at what he sees as Israel’s disproportionate influence in American foreign policy. That will change, he promised, as more Muslims gained political influence.”

Also today, CNN has a review of Ellison’s past statements in defense of Louis Farrakhan and other far left groups:

When the then-executive director of The Minneapolis Initiative Against Racism, Joanne Jackson, came under fire in 1997 for allegedly saying during a forum that Jews are the most racist white people she knows and that she did not think Farrakhan was a racist, Ellison, who identified by his religious name of Keith Ellison-Muhammad, defended her, saying, “She is correct about Minister Farrakhan. He is not a racist. He is also not an anti-Semite.” (Ellison would later address this incident in 2006, writing in a letter to a local Jewish group, “While some at that meeting justified her comments, I spoke out in favor of increased dialogue between the Jewish and African-American communities. I believe that Ms. Jackson’s alleged remarks were clearly bigoted, discriminatory story, inappropriate, and even ridiculous.”)…

As recent as 2000, Ellison publicly defended violent, fringe elements of the far-left. He appeared at a fundraiser that year for domestic terrorist Sara Jane Olson, a member of the self-styled revolutionary group the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA), which is best known for kidnapping heiress Patricia Hearst. Olson was apprehended in 1999 in relation to the 1975 attempted bombings of two police cars and the slaying of Myrna Opsah during a bank robbery…

Ellison also spoke favorably of convicted cop killer Assata Shakur and expressed his opposition to any attempt to extradite her to the United States from Cuba, where she had fled after escaping prison.

Ellison is considered the leading contender to replace interim DNC chairwoman Donna Brazile.

]]>3934131Opposite Day: Debbie Downer blames Bernie Sanders for her downfallhttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/11/19/opposite-day-debbie-downer-blames-bernie-sanders-for-her-downfall/
Sat, 19 Nov 2016 15:01:56 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3932539The finger pointing and recrimination continues inside the Democratic Party as the reality of a looming Donald Trump presidency sinks in. And not all of it has to do with what went so spectacularly wrong with Hillary Clinton’s candidacy. The entire Democratic primary claimed a lot of victims, including the loss by Bernie Sanders and the ouster of former DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz. Usually you hear Sanders supporters blaming Debbie for rigging the game against him, but in an interview with Vice News, she attempts to turn the tables, claiming that Bernie used her as a scapegoat. (Real Clear Politics)

DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ: I will be frank with you. If I was trying to rig the outcome of the primary, trust me, I could have — there are so many things that we, not I, we could have done to enhance the campaign of one candidate over another…

It was mind-boggling to me that he was complaining about the number of debates. Because, things were going just fine [for him]. I think the Sanders campaign began to aggressively find a scapegoat to turn the attention away from mistakes that they made. And they did so successfully. But that’s okay.

Perhaps I’m a bit fuzzy on the definition of “scapegoat” but we don’t generally associate it with accusing someone of something they actually did. The details which emerged from that torrid affair went well beyond the fact that DWS scheduled the Democrats’ debates to be few in number and in time slots where the Home Shopping Network would give them a run for their money in the ratings. They were playing games with the campaign donations as well. Liberal outlet Daily KOS reported back in April that large dollar donations were effectively being laundered and flushed back to the DNC, primarily to Clinton’s benefit.And let’s not even get started on the Donna Brazile cheating scandal. If Debbie didn’t know about that (a dubious proposition at best) then the most we could say is that she was criminally incompetent rather than simply complicit.

But let’s take DWS at her own word. Clinton was always doing better with the party regulars while Sanders was bringing a surge of independent voters into the fold. Back during the heat of the primary, Debbie went on the record saying that if she’d had her way, none of those pesky independents would be voting at all. (The Hill)

Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) said if it was her decision, she would scrap open primaries and only allow voters registered as Democrats to participate in primaries.

“I believe that the party’s nominee should be chosen — this is Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s opinion — that the party’s nominee should be chosen by members of the party,” the Florida lawmaker said during an interview with “MSNBC Live” on Monday, according to The Washington Examiner.

So who precisely is the “scapegoat” in this situation? Bernie Sanders accused the chairwoman and the rest of the DNC leadership of having their fingers on the scale in Hillary’s favor. Now that she’s been shown the door, Debbie is trying to pin the blame on Bernie. The Wikileaks revelations made it all very clear, and DWS probably shouldn’t be bragging about how she could have rigged the primary “if she’d wanted to.” That page is already written in the history books and Sanders has a very legitimate gripe. But in the end, he wound up with a very senior spot in the Senate leadership and she’s out in the cold. Perhaps there was a small sliver of justice for Bernie after all.

]]>3932539DNC charter specifies a full-time chairmanhttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/11/15/dnc-charter-specifies-a-full-time-chairman/
Wed, 16 Nov 2016 02:21:43 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3932056It turns out the DNC charter specifies that the chairman of the party be a full time position. The Hill reports that the party ignored that rule during the tenure of Debbie Wasserman-Schultz and appears poised to ignore it again to select Rep. Keith Ellison as the next chairman:

“The National Chairperson shall serve full time and shall receive such compensation as may be determined by agreement between the Chairperson and the Democratic National Committee,” Article V, Section Four of the charter reads.

Some Democrats believe the party overlooked that portion of the charter to accommodate Wasserman Schultz because President Obama directly appointed her…

Some Democrats believe that even under a strict reading of the charter, the party would waive the provision if it sees Ellison – the first Muslim elected to Congress and a member of the Congressional Black Caucus – as best equipped to lead.

Obviously the rules are not going to be a deal-breaker in the party of Clinton and Obama. But Howard Dean who is seen as the most serious challenger to Ellison’s bid, has already raised the idea that DNC chair should not be a part-time job. “This job is 80-90 hours a week. You can’t do both,” Dean said. At 10 minutes into this clip there is video of Dean making the case followed by Ellison responding:

Ellison tells MSNBC, “The people who know me know that nobody is going to outwork me. I’m going to be tireless working all the time and I’m going to be making sure that the message gets to the people.”

]]>3932056Why we all need to support Howard Dean as the new DNC chairhttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/11/11/why-we-all-need-to-support-howard-dean-as-the-new-dnc-chair/
Fri, 11 Nov 2016 13:01:08 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3931418The Democratic National Committee, still in the process of licking their wounds from Tuesday’s shellacking, is currently operating under the leadership of an interim chairperson. Soon they will need to select someone for the position on a more official basis. Stepping up to volunteer his services during this tumultuous period is none other than former governor, presidential candidate and previous chairman, Howard Dean. Yes… that Howard Dean. (The Hill)

Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean on Thursday announced he will be run (sic) for Democratic National Committee (DNC) chairman.

“The dems need organization and focus on the young. Need a fifty State strategy and tech rehab. I am in for chairman again,” Dean tweeted Thursday afternoon.

Dean served as DNC chair from 2005 to 2009, overseeing huge gains for Democrats in Congress and Barack Obama’s first presidential election.

You might be tempted to think that the title of this piece is sarcastic, but I’m completely serious. Having Howard Dean return to a leadership post at the top of the DNC would probably be just about the best thing conservatives could hope for over the next four years. The reason for this can be found in the person of the woman who held the position up until the Democrats’ convention this summer. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz was, if anything, a significant contributing factor in the losses the Democrats’ suffered. Her antics were legendary among Republican circles. She was on television constantly, saying the craziest things you could imagine, frequently to the point where even the most liberal media mavens were left with blank stares on their faces. Her abject denial of reality throughout all of Hillary Clinton’s scandals robbed the party of much of the credibility they needed in a presidential election season.

Enter Howard Dean. Even during a time when he’s held no official, high level position in the party (he currently lists his occupation as a consultant and commentator), the man is on television constantly and we can expect that he would continue this pattern as chairman. His entertainment value and ability to further damage the party brand should be beyond question. And we don’t even need to bring up the now famous “Dean Scream” for subject material here.

Remember that this is the same guy who went on national TV and claimed that Donald Trump is a coke addict. And then doubled down on it after being challenged. His penchant for screaming carried over long after his own failed presidential bid. While attempting to defend Hillary Clinton this year he began yelling at a reporter, “What more do you want!?” when he was pressed about her email server. That precious moment was enshrined on video.

Dean is also famous for being unable to stay on message when carrying the Democrats’ platform to the press. You may recall when he famously suggested that America should probably walk away from the Iran deal just as Barack Obama and John Kerry were pushing it the hardest. And even when he does manage to say on message, he tends to go overboard in the other direction, acting as if he lives in some sort of fantasy world. Remember when he proclaimed that the terrorists probably aren’t even Muslims?

Dean becomes unhinged at the drop of a hat and his utter hatred and contempt for Donald Trump in particular and Republicans in general should keep him at the boiling point constantly over the next two years of completely GOP controlled governance. Much as we saw with Wasserman-Schultz, this can only be good news for conservatives.

Let’s also remember that the credentials most people are citing as his chief qualifications are rather suspect at best. He’s “credited” with being instrumental in the significant gains that the Democrats made in 2006 and 2008. But think about the period in question. The country was already weary of war (having no idea how much further we had to go) and blaming Bush for it in 2006. By the time the 2008 elections rolled around the economy had collapsed. The job of DNC chair at that time could have been done by an arthritic poodle if it could just manage to stay out of the way and let the GOP implode.

Now let’s consider what our alternatives are if it doesn’t wind up being Dean. The person we don’t want is the one currently holding the interim chairmanship. Yes, Donna Brazile has been exposed as a cheating liar by multiple Wikileaks revelations and might be seen as too damaged to keep the job, but don’t allow that to pacify you into thinking she’s no longer dangerous. She has a ton of friends in both the DNC and the media. I spoke on background a few weeks ago with one reporter who was still in shock over the the revelations that Brazile had cheated during the primary debates. Rather than being furious or indignant, this journalist said that they were “heartbroken.” Donna Brazile has some magic about her and even if she’s not the Chairwoman I wouldn’t expect her to disappear any time soon.

Brazile has an uncanny ability to handle the most difficult situations for the Democrats with a nearly unshakable air of calm and confidence. You could point out to her that her hair was on fire during an interview and she’d chuckle with that disarming smile of hers and the composure of a friendly mom taking a fresh tray of cookies out of the oven as she told you not to worry. It’s just a new hairstyle she’s trying.

Given a choice between Donna Brazile and Howard Dean it’s not even a close call. We want Dean on television every day for the next two or four years with his head exploding and a fountain of easily refutable nonsense spouting out of his mouth.

]]>3931418Donna Brazile got an earful at the first post-Trump DNC meetinghttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/11/10/donna-brazile-got-an-earful-at-the-first-post-trump-dnc-meeting/
Fri, 11 Nov 2016 01:01:16 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3931384The Huffington Post reports that interim DNC chairwoman Donna Brazile got quite an earful when she tried to rally the troops on Thursday. As Brazile gave a speech to 150 staffers she was interrupted by someone identified only as Zach who refused to be mollified:

“Why should we trust you as chair to lead us through this?” he asked, according to two people in the room. “You backed a flawed candidate, and your friend [former DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz] plotted through this to support your own gain and yourself.”

Some DNC staffers started to boo and some told him to sit down. Brazile began to answer, but Zach had more to say.

“You are part of the problem,” he continued, blaming Brazile for clearing the path for Trump’s victory by siding with Clinton early on. “You and your friends will die of old age and I’m going to die from climate change. You and your friends let this happen, which is going to cut 40 years off my life expectancy.”

After that outburst, which was confirmed to HuffPost by two people in the room, Zach walked out. That’s sort of cool. Certainly his rant about Brazile not being trustworthy and backing a flawed candidate is priceless. It sounds as if he was reading some of those Wikileaks stories in his off-hours. It also makes me wonder how many other disillusioned DNC staffers were listening to Brazile drone on and thinking about finding a new job.

So Zach gets some points for courage but he really went overboard claiming he’s going to “die from climate change.” Here’s a little word problem that could appear on the next DNC job application:

Zach would have lived to 80 but is now going to die 40 years earlier because of climate change. If Zach is 20 now, when does the world end?

Answer: 2036 is the date when at least one former DNC staffer thinks human life on earth will cease to exist. That seems a bit extreme even for a disgruntled former DNC staffer.

]]>3931384Report: DNC headquarters may have been buggedhttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/11/04/report-dnc-may-bugged/
Sat, 05 Nov 2016 00:41:50 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3930381There’s an exclusive report this afternoon at Mother Jones saying the DNC has informed the FBI that it turned up evidence its offices were bugged:

In late October, after conservative activist James O’Keefe released a new set of hidden-camera videos targeting Democrats, interim party chairwoman Donna Brazile ordered up another sweep. There was a concern that Republican foes might have infiltrated the DNC offices, where volunteers were reporting to work on phone banks and other election activities. (For some of their actions, O’Keefe and his crew have used people posing as volunteers to gain access to Democratic outfits.)

The second sweep, according to the Democratic officials, found a radio signal near the chairman’s office that indicated there might be a listening device outside the office. “We were told that this was something that could pick up calls from cellphones,” a DNC official says. “The guys who did the sweep said it was a strong indication.” No device was recovered. No possible culprits were identified.

Author David Corn opens the story by saying it is “reminiscent” of Watergate but that seems like a stretch given what little we know about who is responsible or, frankly, whether anything happened at all.

The quotes in this story are coming from unnamed DNC officials so it seems someone decided to leak this story to Mother Jones at this moment right before the election. I guess the agenda here is to reinforce the claim that Russia is working to take down Hillary Clinton.

That might be more convincing if the investigation had found 1) a suspicious device or 2) evidence someone planted the device or 3) confirmation this signal even came from such a device. As it is this is a report about a radio signal that “might be a listening device.” That’s interesting and may lead to something down the line but it would be helpful to know what else the signal might have been and also to have some idea why no one could find the device after picking up the signal. Did someone spirit it away after the signal was discovered. Was it being operated from one of those listening vans you always see in the movies? There’s not a lot here on which to base any conclusions.

]]>3930381Tech analysis of emails leaves us wondering how Donna Brazile is still working at the DNChttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/10/25/tech-analysis-emails-leaves-us-wondering-donna-brazile-still-working-dnc/
Tue, 25 Oct 2016 13:01:37 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3928559Ever since John Podesta’s emails revealed that interim DNC chair Donna Brazile had sent at least one debate question to Hillary Clinton’s team in advance she has denied the charges. Of course, that’s not exactly the case. Nobody seems to have been able to get Donna to say that she didn’t do it. She simply tells us that she won’t be persecuted, while implying that the Russians altered the emails. But could the hackers have done that even if they wished?

A new analysis of the suspicious email in question has revealed that not only are the emails likely valid, but it would be nearly impossible for them to have been altered in the way Brazile is suggesting. First we are reminded of the flat denial which Brazile made to Megyn Kelly on Fox when the question was put to her. (Fox News)

“I have seen so many doctored emails. I have seen things that come from me at 2 in the morning that I don’t even send,” she said, adding, “I will not sit here and be persecuted, because your information is totally false.”

But as the test results show, Brazile is flat out lying yet again.

DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) is a system employed by many email servers, including HillaryClinton.com, to verify emails to recipients and avoid spam filters. The system sends a DKIM “key” to the receiver to verify the sender and confirm the email hasn’t been tampered with.

Consequently, bloggers ran the DKIM keys included in this and other emails through verification software, which in turn validated the Palmieri email as both real and undoctored. The Daily Caller also ran a similar test and got the same result.

In a blog post for Errata Security, cybersecurity expert Robert Graham presented his results, and showed that if the emails had been altered in any way, the software would have declared the email unverified.

You can certainly edit the text of an email message before passing it along if you wish, but other copies of it on various servers would quickly put the lie to your claims if such were available. This, however, is far more damning. Unless somebody at the DNC can show a method whereby the identifying keys can be thwarted, these emails are real and unaltered. And if that’s the case, then Donna Brazile is continuing to lie to the American people about her illicit activities during the primary.

Mediaite pointed out how Brazile is a symptom of a much larger problem… one which undermines the faith of the voters not just in elections, but in the media which covers them.

The problem is that she is just the tip of the iceberg to the wider media lie; that the conversation you’re seeing on air about the candidates’ policies (which is rare), backgrounds, and aptitude for office is being delivered by neutral arbiters and journalists.

That’s as big of a lie as Donald Trump cherishing women.

Brazile is joined by a long list of phony “analysts” and “strategists”—as well as anchors and reporters—who were clearly in-the-tank for Hillary Clinton all along.

While I agree with the general point being made, that’s a bit of a soft sell. Saying that Brazile was “in the tank” for Clinton could leave one with the impression that she was simply a supporter and fan while offering a false veneer of neutrality. The interim DNC chair did much more than that. She actively conspired with a willing member of the media to cheat the voters in a presidential primary debate. And for the record I will once again ask the obvious question here: What are the odds that hackers gaining access to only one set of emails on John Podesta’s account uncovered the only instance of the media cheating the system to help out a Democratic candidate?

This wasn’t a CNN analyst and DNC official being a biased cheerleader. This was the media conspiring with a party official to rig the game in Hillary Clinton’s favor. We all know that Democrats and Republicans will be cheering for members of their own party, but Brazile has helped to further undermine the credibility of the media in the minds of the voters, showing that the Fourth Estate’s role in the game is indeed rigged and at least some of the journalists covering the contest are complicit in the effort.

The DNC essentially has zero credibility as long as this known fraud is at the helm. The fact that they won’t cut her loose and that she’s still allowed to show up on cable news to offer commentary tells you all you need to know.

A hazmat crew was called out to clean up the mess. They discovered a highway covered in toilet paper and a “foul smell.” Unfortunately for the DNC, businessman Mark Robins witnessed the dumping and took pictures with his cell phone:

A storm drain is designed to collect rain and funnel it into lakes or streams so it doesn’t flood the streets. It is a separate system from the sewage lines that connect to bathrooms in homes and businesses. Lawrenceville even has a stenciling program designed to remind people that anything poured in a storm drain winds up in the nearest body of fresh water. Dumping sewage in a storm drain is an “arrestable offense” according to Lawrenceville police. The Georgia State Environment Protection Department is now investigating the incident.

After the initial report ran on CBS46, a regional DNC spokesperson issued an apology saying, “This was an honest mistake and we apologize to the Lawrenceville community for any harm we may have caused.” I’m curious how this could have been a mistake, honest or otherwise. Any bus driver for this type of vehicle knows it’s illegal to dump human waste in a storm drain. And the bus clearly didn’t line itself up next to the storm drain by accident.

I’m not suggesting team Hillary had anything to do with this dumb and illegal decision, but it’s a pretty good metaphor for a candidate who clearly believes the rules set up for others do not apply to her.

]]>3927631Former DNC chair: Ya know, we should probably have a plan in place in case Hillary is, er… “unavailable”http://hotair.com/archives/2016/09/13/former-dnc-chair-ya-know-probably-plan-place-case-hillary-er-unavailable/
Tue, 13 Sep 2016 12:01:59 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3922190Allahpundit already mentioned the fact that Cokie Roberts was whispering about determining a possible replacement for Hillary Clinton, but as of yesterday the whispering came fully out of the closet. The realization has dawned that even if the Democrats wanted to – or had to – do it, they still don’t know exactly how that would work. Now a former DNC Chairman is coming out in the open and saying they need to be ready with a plan today, not weeks later when it could be too late.

A former Democratic National Committee chairman says President Barack Obama and the party’s congressional leaders should immediately come up with a process to identify a potential successor candidate for Hillary Clinton for the off-chance a health emergency forces her out of the race.

“Now is the time for all good political leaders to come to the aid of their party,” said Don Fowler, who helmed the DNC from 1995 to 1997, during Bill Clinton’s presidency, and has backed Hillary Clinton since her 2008 presidential bid. “I think the plan should be developed by 6 o’clock this afternoon.”

Fowler said he expects Clinton to fully recover from her bout with pneumonia, which forced her to leave a Sept. 11 memorial event early and cancel an early-week fundraising swing. But he said the Democratic Party would be mistaken to proceed without a contingency plan.

One can only imagine how much Hillary’s blood is boiling to see these conversations taking place inside her own party in a very public way while she’s still ordering new carpeting for the Oval Office. But you can’t blame the rest of the Democrats for wanting to have a Plan B in place even as they stay busy assuring the media that it would never happen. Could they pull it off right now if they had to? How about after the debates are already underway?

I wrote last month about the possible mechanics of replacing Clinton this late in the game, and it appears that it’s still absolutely possible under the law, but man… it would be ugly. Even if you started today, nothing can change some of the early votes which have already been cast. There are questions as to whether the ballots in a number of states could still be changed and those issues will only loom larger as the weeks tick by. In the end, of course, it could come down to the members of the Electoral College, who can vote for whomever they like even if they face some minor repercussions from faithless elector laws. If there’s a replacement candidate in place but people mark ballots for Clinton, they could switch their vote to the replacement. (It’s happened at least nine times before.)

When AP talked about it he suggested that the Democrats would want Hillary out before the debates if there was going to be a change made, if only to give the replacement time to establish their brand and get a different name on the ballots where possible. But barring some truly catastrophic medical event or tragedy, that’s not going to happen. Keep in mind that nobody can take Hillary off the ticket except Hillary. Does anyone honestly think she’s going to voluntarily step aside this close to the finish line, even if there were something horribly wrong with her physically? She’s been working toward putting her name on the list of presidents pretty much since her days at Yale. This is just a gut level impression, obviously, but I’m confident that even if Clinton knew that her time on this Earth wasn’t going to last past February, she’d still keep it under wraps and allow herself to be sworn in just to achieve that goal.

But none of this stops the Democrats from doing what Fowler is suggesting. They may indeed want to have a plan in place just to be on the safe side, and now is clearly the time to settle the matter. A failure to do so would be irresponsible. And while we’re on the subject, the Republicans might want to make sure they have something in place as well because barely a week goes by without some nutjob threatening to take Trump out.

]]>3922190Intel community informed congressional leaders about Russia’s hack of Democrats a year agohttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/08/12/congressional-leaders-knew-about-russia-hacking-democrats-a-year-ago/
Fri, 12 Aug 2016 17:21:39 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3917768Ever since the hack of the Democratic National Committee became news it has seemed as if everyone involved was relatively certain Russia was responsible. One reason for that confidence is revealed today in a story by Reuters. It turns out the intelligence community has been aware of what was going on for a long time. In fact, some top congressional leaders were informed about the attack on Democrats a year ago:

U.S. intelligence officials told top congressional leaders a year ago that Russian hackers were attacking the Democratic Party, three sources familiar with the matter said on Thursday, but the lawmakers were unable to tell the targets about the hacking because the information was so secret.

The disclosure of the Top Secret information would have revealed that U.S. intelligence agencies were continuing to monitor the hacking, as well as the sensitive intelligence sources and the methods they were using to do it.

Eight members of congress were informed last summer including four Republicans and four Democrats. However, the DNC did not learn of the problem until months later:

DNC officials have said they did not learn about the hacking until months after the initial congressional briefing, when an agent from an FBI cybersecurity squad asked them last fall about the party’s data security arrangements.

When the Clinton campaign detected an intrusion in March, the FBI gave them some general information but did not tell them how long the intrusion had been going on or mention that Russia was responsible.

This story raises all sort of questions that we are not likely to get answered any time soon. First off, how could the NSA/FBI know about attacks on the DNC (and know where the attacks were coming from) so quickly? The Reuters story suggests the answer to that question is very highly classified since the FBI was willing to allow the hack to continue rather than risk revealing that the U.S. was aware of it.

The other question that comes to mind: What changed? If the fact that the U.S. was aware of this a year ago was very sensitive then, isn’t it just a sensitive now? If the point was to not let Russia know about our ability to detect cyber intrusion, hasn’t this leak just blown that?

I guess the upside here is that the Russian hackers must not be feeling so cocky right now. They thought they were getting away with something but it turns out our intelligence agencies were quietly watching them the whole time.

]]>3917768Russian hack of Democrats more widespread than previously believedhttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/08/11/hack-of-democrats-was-much-more-widespread-than-believed/
Thu, 11 Aug 2016 17:21:08 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3917582The hack of the Democratic National Committee was just the tip of the iceberg. The FBI has expanded its investigation after discovering that as many as 100 Democratic party officials were hacked. From the NY Times:

The widening scope of the attack has prompted the F.B.I. to broaden its investigation, and agents have begun notifying a long list of Democratic officials that the Russians may have breached their personal accounts.

The main targets appear to have been the personal email accounts of Hillary Clinton’s campaign officials and party operatives, along with a number of party organizations.

The NY Times takes it as a given that Russia was behind the hack. Later in the story we learn the reason for that:

F.B.I. officials briefed staff members of House and Senate Intelligence Committees last week on the investigation into the theft of emails and documents from the Democratic National Committee…

Much of the briefing to the committee staff focused on the fact that American intelligence agencies have virtually no doubt that the Russian government was behind the theft, according to one staff member, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss elements of the confidential briefing.

The FBI is said to be unsure whether the hack of the DNC, DCCC and Clinton campaign officials was part of a relatively routine cyber-intrusion by Russia or whether it was specifically intended to impact the 2016 election.

Whatever the intent, it has already made an impact on the race. Last month, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz resigned her position as DNC chair in the wake of WikiLeaks release of 20,000 DNC emails. And just last week, the DNC announced the resignation of three more senior leaders, including CEO Amy Dacey. All three had been part of an embarrassing email chain in which the possibility of publicly questioning Bernie Sanders’ religion was raised as a way to damage him in the primaries.

WikiLeaks has refused to acknowledge that Russia is the source of the material it has released. This week, Julian Assange helped fuel an online conspiracy theory suggesting a murdered DNC staffer may have been his source. The staffer’s family later issued a statement asking the conspiracy theorists to stop politicizing their personal tragedy.

]]>3917582Seth Rich’s family to conspiracy theorists: Please stophttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/08/10/seth-richs-family-to-conspiracy-theorists-please-stop/
Wed, 10 Aug 2016 19:01:32 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3917446The family of Seth Rich, the Democratic National Committee staffer who was shot and killed in Washington D.C. last month, wants to put a stop to the conspiracy theories surrounding his death. Family spokesman Brad Bauman gave a statement to Business Insider:

“The family welcomes any and all information that could lead to the identification of the individuals responsible, and certainly welcomes contributions that could lead to new avenues of investigation,” Bauman said…

“That said, some are attempting to politicize this horrible tragedy, and in their attempts to do so, are actually causing more harm than good and impeding on the ability for law enforcement to properly do their job. For the sake of finding Seth’s killer, and for the sake of giving the family the space they need at this terrible time, they are asking for the public to refrain from pushing unproven and harmful theories about Seth’s murder.”

The statement doesn’t name anyone in particular but the timing suggests it is a response to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Tuesday, WikiLeaks announced a $20,000 reward for information leading to Rich’s killer. That fueled online conspiracy theories that Rich may have been the source of the DNC material published by WikiLeaks. Also yesterday, Julian Assange gave an interview to a Dutch TV network in which he suggested it was possible Rich was killed because he was a source. Here’s a portion of it:

Assange: We don’t comment on who are sources are.

Host: But why make the suggestion about a young guy being shot in the streets of Washington?

Assange: Because we have to understand how high the stakes are in the United States and that our sources are…our sources face serious risks, that’s why they come to us so we can protect their anonymity.

Assange is suggesting this might have been a hit straight out of a political thriller. But if Rich really was his source, why not just say so? Isn’t it more important to find the killer, especially if the killer was responding to the leak, than to protect the anonymity of the dead?

The other, more likely, explanation is that Rich’s death had nothing to do with his work at the DNC or with WikiLeaks. Tuesday a police spokesman told Business Insider, “At this time, there is no indication that Seth Rich’s death is connected to his employment at the DNC.” Police have suggested the shooting may have been a robbery gone wrong.

Assange appears to be capitalizing on a family’s personal tragedy to distract from the unpleasant truth that his DNC material was not a leak from an idealistic whistleblower. In fact, the material was likely stolen by Russian hackers engaged in international espionage. That’s not the sort of thing WikiLeaks wants to admit it is involved with.

]]>3917446DNC removes leaders who planned to question Bernie Sanders’ religionhttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/08/02/dnc-replaces-top-leaders-who-planned-to-question-sanders-religion/
Tue, 02 Aug 2016 20:01:52 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3916077Three leaders at the Democratic National Committee who discussed the possibility of questioning Bernie Sanders’ religious faith as a way to hurt his chances with voters have resigned. The DNC press release praises outgoing CEO Amy Dacey, CFO Brad Marshall and Communications Director Luis Miranda but never mentions why they are leaving. From the DNC press release:

As the DNC moves into the general election phase of the 2016 campaign, new Chair Donna Brazile today announced the departures of Amy Dacey, Luis Miranda, and Brad Marshall…

“Thanks in part to the hard work of Amy, Luis, and Brad, the Democratic Party has adopted the most progressive platform in history, has put itself in financial position to win in November, and has begun the important work of investing in state party partnerships. I’m so grateful for their commitment to this cause, and I wish them continued success in the next chapter of their career.”

Not mentioned in the DNC press release is the real reason these three are following former chairwoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz out the door. Hackers, who are apparently connected to the Russian government, took 20,000 internal DNC emails (and some voicemails) and handed them to Wikileaks. Wikileaks posted the material online a few days before the start of the Democratic National Convention.

The hacked emails revealed that the seemingly contentious relationship between the DNC and the Sanders campaign was not part of Sanders’ imagination. One of the most incriminating exchanges involved CFO Brad Marshall’s suggestion that the DNC should prompt a question about Bernie Sanders’ religious faith (or lack thereof) as a way to hurt him in the Kentucky and West Virginia primaries. The response to this suggestion from CEO Amy Dacey was “AMEN.” Communications Director Luis Miranda was also on the email chain.

It has been a foregone conclusion that some of these people would be out at the DNC but there has apparently been hesitation as the organization waits for Wikileaks to drop the other shoe.

Last week Reuters reported computers belonging to the Clinton campaign were also hacked by a foreign government. The FBI has not confirmed the hack is connected to the hack of the DNC and the DCCC but that seems to be the operating assumption.

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has already said he has more material on Hillary Clinton which he plans to release before the election.

]]>3916077The Clinton campaign was also hacked by a foreign governmenthttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/07/29/report-the-clinton-campaign-was-hacked-too/
Fri, 29 Jul 2016 22:01:47 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3915592Reuters reports the Clinton campaign was also the subject of a hack by a foreign government:

The computer network used by Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign was hacked as part of a broad cyber attack on Democratic political organizations, people familiar with the matter told Reuters…

The involvement of the Justice Department’s national security division is a sign that the Obama administration has concluded that the hacking was state sponsored, individuals with knowledge of the investigation said.

The Reuters reports follows previous stories including this one at the Washington Post which indicated the Clinton camp had been warned about a possible hack. However that story said there was no evidence the hack had been successful. Thursday night, Yahoo News published a story revealing more details about the FBI warning to the Clinton camp:

The FBI warned the Clinton campaign that it was a target of a cyberattack last March, just weeks before the Democratic National Committee discovered it had been penetrated by hackers it now believes were working for Russian intelligence, two sources who have been briefed on the matter told Yahoo News.

In a meeting with senior officials at the campaign’s Brooklyn headquarters, FBI agents laid out concerns that cyberhackers had used so-called spear-phishing emails as part of an attempt to penetrate the campaign’s computers, the sources said. One of the sources said agents conducting a national security investigation asked the Clinton campaign to turn over internal computer logs as well as the personal email addresses of senior campaign officials. But the campaign, through its lawyers, declined to provide the data, deciding that the FBI’s request for sensitive personal and campaign information data was too broad and intrusive, the source said.

It’s interesting that the Clinton campaign refused to turn over information to the FBI. One possible reason beyond the one they gave: It might take the decision whether to say anything about the hack out of their hands.

At the time the FBI issued the warning to the campaign it did not identify a possible source of the attack. However, there has been mounting evidence Russia was behind the DNC hack which took place at the same time. This week a group called ThreatConnect revealed evidence that Guccifer 2.0, a person claiming to be the DNC hacker, is likely a fictitious character created as part of a Russian propaganda effort. The FBI also announced it was looking into the DNC earlier this week.

Though Wikileaks has not revealed the source of the DNC emails and phone messages it has released, founder Julian Assange has suggested he has more (and more damaging) information yet to come. A number of stories published this week have suggested Democrats are nervous about what may be in the next leak.

]]>3915592DNC staffers waiting for Wikileaks to drop the other shoehttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/07/28/dnc-staffers-waiting-for-wikileaks-to-drop-the-other-shoe/
Thu, 28 Jul 2016 19:01:50 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3915353The resignation of DNC chairwoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz came shortly after Wikileaks published hacked DNC emails which showed the organization gunning for Bernie Sanders. Today Politico reports staffers are expecting more to come with some senior people having already been asked to prepare resignation statements:

Last week’s WikiLeaks dump, releasing thousands of emails showing DNC officials sparring with Bernie Sanders supporters and with one another, was what finally got Hillary Clinton’s top aides to force her out Sunday on the eve of the convention.

Now, all DNC senior staffers seem to believe they’re on the verge of being fired — and that’s before the next WikiLeaks release, which many fear is coming within days, and which DNC lawyers are bracing for. Several staff members have already been asked to prepare statements about their departures.

Staff members were briefed in a Tuesday afternoon meeting in Washington that their personal data was part of the hack, as were Social Security numbers and other information for donors, according to people who attended. Don’t search WikiLeaks, they were told — malware is embedded throughout the site, and they’re looking for more data.

Julian Assange, founder of Wikileaks, has promised the group will release “a lot more material in the near future.”

The fate of DNC staffers is really just a sidebar in a story focused on the discontent with Wasserman-Schultz in the months before her resignation. As Politico describes it, everyone from the Clinton campaign to the White House to House Democrats were frustrated with her behavior but chose to look the other way until the Wikileaks story made that impossible.

The story opens with an example in which Wasserman-Schultz was supposed to ask Vice President Biden for help with DNC fundraising. Instead she asked him to do a fundraiser for her reelection and also asked him to attend her daughter’s bat mitzvah in Florida. Here’s another example that frustrated Democrats:

Frustration within the DNC, the White House and the Clinton campaign was exacerbated by Wasserman Schultz’s efforts to raise her own profile by appearing more often on national television…

But Wasserman Schultz’s increased television activity increased her problems. After the raucous Nevada state convention in May, she went on the attack against Sanders and his supporters, and an enraged Sanders responded by calling for her resignation.

Just at the point when Democratic leaders were hoping to shift toward more party unity, she’d inflamed the situation and put herself in the middle of it.

There’s a certain irony at work here. Evidence suggests Russia was behind the hack of the DNC. Many Democrats, including those still at the DNC and people in the Clinton camp, have suggested it is part of an effort by Vladmir Putin to help Donald Trump win the 2016 election. But so far the biggest impact of the hack has been to dislodge the bumbling Wasserman-Schultz from her position at the DNC, paving the way for someone who will likely to do a much better job making the case for the Democratic party.

]]>3915353Evidence suggests Guccifer 2.0 is a Russian propaganda efforthttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/07/26/evidence-suggests-guccifer-2-0-is-a-russian-propaganda-effort/
Tue, 26 Jul 2016 23:01:50 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3914972There has been an apparent breakthrough related to the hack of the Democratic National Committee. TheatConnect, a collection of cyber-security experts, has uncovered evidence indicating that Guccifer 2.0, the alleged Romanian hacker, is actually a propaganda effort created by the Russian government.

If you haven’t been paying much attention to this story, you might want to start here. Essentially there is technical evidence suggesting Russia is behind the DNC hack. However, one day after initial conclusions were announced (that Russia was responsible) a hacker calling himself Guccifer 2.0 appeared online and claimed responsibility for the hack. Here’s what I wrote about Guccifer 2.0 yesterday:

And that’s really the question. Is Guccifer 2.0 really an independent Romanian hacker or just a distraction created by government backed Russian hackers as a way to politically launder this material. The Clinton camp thinks the answer is the latter and they may be right.

According to ThreatConnect, their investigation points to Guccifer 2.0 being Russian propaganda:

As we pointed out in our previous analysis, we conclude Guccifer 2.0 is an apparition created under a hasty Russian D&D campaign, which has clearly evolved into an Active Measures Campaign. Those who are operating under the Guccifer 2.0 Twitter, WordPress and Email communications are likely made up a cadre of non-technical politruk attempting to establish “Guccifer 2.0” as a static fixture on the world stage along the likes of Manning, Assange or Snowden. Their use of Russian VPN services with French infrastructure may shed light on a method Russian intelligence operatives use — domestic services coupled with foreign infrastructure — to help hide their hand and deter any potential attribution to Russia…

Our research into Guccifer 2.0’s infrastructure further solidifies our assessment that the persona is a Russia-controlled platform that can act as a censored hacktivist. Moscow determines what Guccifer 2.0 shares and thus can attempt to selectively impact media coverage, and potentially the election, in a way that ultimately benefits their national objectives.

The Hill notes Guccifer 2.0 (or whoever is pretending to be him) has previously claimed not to speak any Russian, which makes it very difficult to explain how he signed up for Russian VPN services:

Guccifer 2.0 has long claimed to be Romanian. In an online chat interview with Motherboard, Guccifer 2.0 claimed not to know how to speak Russian. In it, Motherboard asked a question in Russian, and Guccifer replied “What’s this? Is it russian?”…

In the same interview, when forced to answered questions in Romanian, he used such clunky grammar and terminology that experts believed he was using an online translator.

If you’re wondering why Russia would go through all this trouble to meddle in a U.S. election, I discussed one possible explanation here.

]]>3914972Is the DNC leak Putin’s payback for State Department’s involvement in Russia’s elections?http://hotair.com/archives/2016/07/26/is-the-dnc-leak-putins-idea-of-payback/
Tue, 26 Jul 2016 17:01:15 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3914895As I noted yesterday, there is good reason to believe the hack of the Democratic National Committee was carried out by Russian hackers with connections to the government. Several outside groups hired by the DNC have already determined that is the case and, as Allahpundit pointed out, the FBI is already leaning in that direction as well. In a story published Monday evening, Politico suggests a possible motive for the hack: Putin has a grudge against Hillary Clinton over the State Department’s involvement in the Russian elections in 2011.

Former U.S. officials who worked on Russia policy with Clinton say that Putin was personally stung by Clinton’s December 2011 condemnation of Russia’s parliamentary elections, and had his anger communicated directly to President Barack Obama. They say Putin and his advisers are also keenly aware that, even as she executed Obama’s “reset” policy with Russia, Clinton took a harder line toward Moscow than others in the administration. And they say Putin sees Clinton as a forceful proponent of “regime change” policies that the Russian leader considers a grave threat to his own survival.

“He was very upset [with Clinton] and continued to be for the rest of the time that I was in government,” said Michael McFaul, who served as the top Russia official in Obama’s national security council from 2009 to December 2011 and then was U.S. ambassador to Moscow until early 2014. “One could speculate that this is his moment for payback.”

The idea that Putin was irritated with Clinton over interference in the election seems well supported. Kremlin-controlled RT published a story in December 2011 alleging that the State Department was paying an election observer for stories of election violations:

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin had harsh words for Clinton, saying she had “set the tone for some opposition activists, gave them a signal … and [they] started active work.”

Speaking at a meeting of the Popular Front Federal Coordinating Council this week, Putin said that “representatives of some foreign states” were paying politically-active NGOs in Russia to “influence the course of the election campaign in our country.”

“We need to safeguard ourselves from this interference in our internal affairs and defend our sovereignty,” the Prime Minister said. “It is necessary to think about improving the law and toughening responsibility for those who take orders from foreign states to influence internal political processes.”

Putin, stressing that Russia has nothing against the presence of foreign observers at elections, said Russia would draw the line at interference in its internal affairs from abroad.

“We favor foreign observers monitoring our political electoral processes. We favor this, we are not against this,” he said. “However…when financing comes to some domestic organizations which are supposedly national, but which in fact work on foreign money and perform to the music of a foreign state during electoral processes, we need to safeguard ourselves from this interference in our internal affairs and defend our sovereignty.”

It’s not completely clear from the RT story but it seems all of this came to light after someone hacked the email of the Russian election monitoring group showing the email traffic between them and the U.S. State Department.

Clearly there’s still some speculation here but it does suggest a possible explanation for why the DNC was the subject of this embarrassing leak while the RNC has been passed over by the hackers.

]]>3914895The DNC platform will demand that the Justice Department investigate… oil companieshttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/06/26/the-dnc-platform-will-demand-that-the-justice-department-investigate-oil-companies/
Sun, 26 Jun 2016 15:01:46 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3910674Having solved all other problems in the nation and the world at large, the Democrats have begun finalizing their platform for the big Philadelphia convention and Hillary Clinton’s general election campaign. They’re going after the big fish in the pond, too. Why worry about little things like ISIS supporters shooting up night clubs or rising murder rates in our cities when you can investigate Exxon? (Inside Climate News)

The committee drafting a platform for Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party unanimously called on Friday for the Justice Department to investigate fossil fuel companies, such as ExxonMobil Corporation. The oil company has been accused of misleading shareholders and the public about the risks of climate change…

The effect of the session, one of several forums around the country, was to intensify the partisan heat around criticism of Exxon’s climate record, while allowing the Clinton camp to stake out political territory that is not quite so harsh on oil, coal and natural gas companies.

Yes, you read that correctly. In what seems to indeed be a continuation of the Obama administration’s policies, the DNC will be promising another term where the White House will politicize federal law enforcement and use the Justice Department to punish their political enemies and score points with their base. But what’s nearly as interesting as what Bernie’s army and the green energy warriors got out of the deal was what they didn’t get.

Much to the chagrin of the far Left, the platform does not call for a complete ban on fracking. That one is a no brainer since fracking has been absolved of pretty much all of its ecological sins, even by the EPA. But even more to the point, it’s keeping a lot of people employed in several key swing states. We wouldn’t want to lose an election over something like that, now would we?

Also, there’s no carbon tax in the platform. Bernie Sanders managed to scare off enough of their own base with his massive tax plans (which made even Hillary’s look tame by comparison) and a huge hit to lower and middle income consumers on their energy bills wasn’t going to go over very well. The also refused to include a “climate test” for the approval of future energy projects like Keystone XL. In place of that they dangled another carrot in front of the green energy crowd. (Emphasis added)

But the platform panel, according to RL Miller, founder of the advocacy group Climate Hawks Vote, did accept a goal of obtaining all U.S. energy from renewable fuels by 2050.

That ambition would support the new Paris climate agreement’s goals and is hardly compatible with a business-as-usual or “all-of-the-above” energy policy. And it is a far cry from the pro-drilling, pro-fracking, pro-fossil fuels stance of the Republican Party and its candidate, Donald Trump.

“We’re thrilled that the Democratic Party will formally recognize the need to hold fossil fuel companies accountable for their deceit,” Miller said. “And we’re happy that the committee is calling for the United States to be 100% powered by clean energy by 2050. However, we don’t see how we’ll make that bold leap with baby steps.”

So we’re going to be 100% powered by “clean energy” in only 34 years, eh? Does anyone – even among the Democrats – actually believe the hogwash they’re pumping into this platform? I suppose the definition of “clean energy” could be tinkered with a bit here when they try to explain this away. Does nuclear count? It’s not a “fossil fuel” by definition, but I doubt the hipsters think of it as very “clean” either. Let’s see where we got our energy last year.

When liberals talk about “clean energy” they are referring almost entirely to wind and solar. Currently those two resources are proving a whopping 5.3% of our nation’s energy needs combined, and that’s only with massive government subsidies to keep them afloat. You’re going to make up the other nearly 95% in the next three and a half decades?

Pull the other one, chief. It’s got bells on it.

]]>3910674Sanders: Democratic convention is going to be ‘messy’http://hotair.com/archives/2016/05/24/sanders-democratic-convention-is-going-to-be-messy/
Tue, 24 May 2016 17:21:58 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3906233Bernie Sanders continues to play with fire. In an interview with the Associated Press, Sanders says the Democratic National Convention this summer could get “messy” if the party does not make the right choice. The AP reports:

Sanders said he will “condemn any and all forms of violence” but his campaign was welcoming political newcomers and first-time attendees of party conventions. He said the Democratic Party faces a choice of becoming more inclusive or maintaining the status quo.

“I think if they make the right choice and open the doors to working-class people and young people and create the kind of dynamism that the Democratic Party needs, it’s going to be messy,” Sanders said.

“Democracy is not always nice and quiet and gentle but that is where the Democratic Party should go.”

That message is bound to worry fellow Democrats, especially since Sanders is also downplaying the behavior at the Nevada Democratic convention. Sanders tells the AP he was “bothered” by the coverage because while there was “rowdyism” (which he agrees was inappropriate) there was no violence.

After the AP story was published, Sanders appeared on NBC’s Today show to clarify his “messy” remark. Politico reports:

“The media often takes words out of context. The context of that was that democracy is messy. That people will have vigorous debate on the issues,” Sanders told NBC News’ Kristen Welker in an interview aired Tuesday on “Today.” Asked whether the convention itself will be messy, Sanders replied, “Well of course it will be. But everything — that’s what democracy is about.”

Sanders also bristled at the suggestion that his staying in the race would hurt Hillary Clinton against Donald Trump, snapping, “I guess if we take your assumption, and Clinton supporters’ assumption, that that is the logical conclusion, we should go back to a monarchy and not have any election at all.”

Sanders is certainly not my cup of tea but you sort of have to admire a guy who, unlike everyone else (except perhaps Trump), refuses to be intimidated by the Clinton machine. He is willing to fight it out and even let it get messy despite Clinton’s none-too-subtle hints about what she wants Sanders to do.

]]>3906233DNC Chair: This election isn’t about Hillary Clinton’s emailshttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/03/22/dnc-chair-this-election-isnt-about-hillary-clintons-emails/
Tue, 22 Mar 2016 14:01:10 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3898339For someone who claims that the Democrats are in the cat bird’s seat in terms of winning the election this fall, DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman-Schultz certainly seems to have a chip on her shoulder. She enjoys going on camera with friendly media outlets and talking about Republican “dysfunction” and her party’s excellent positioning for the general election. But if you ask her about Hillary Clinton’s looming legal problems over her email scandal, her tone changes quickly. That’s what happened this week when she went on Fox News and had the obvious and uncomfortable question put to her yet again.

“There is an investigation, period. “ Schultz continued, “I thought she [Hillary Clinton] was right to say she is comfortable, 100% confident that there is no issue there and that she has been completely transparent and she handled the email process correctly and according to the letter of the law.”

She added, “She has released 55,000 pages of emails; This election is not about Hillary Clinton’s emails, her opponent Bernie Sanders has said that. It’s about whether or not we are going to be able to help people who feel like they are not on the firmest ground right now, have more confidence and be able to make sure they can help their kids be better off and make sure they can make the middle class.”

Well, she’s at least right about one thing. The election isn’t about Hillary’s emails… yet. But it’s a rather weak defense to cite Bernie “sick of hearing about your damn emails” Sanders as your point of reference. If Sanders had any edge or grit to his campaign style he would be at least obliquely referencing the FBI investigation at every turn. What precisely do the Democrats plan to do if they host a Clinton coronation in Philadelphia and she winds up being indicted in the following weeks? That’s the sort of headline that doesn’t make for very good bumper stickers.

Just yesterday we looked at the position James Comey finds himself in and whether or not he will be dropping such a case at the feet of Loretta Lynch. But Hillary still sounds confident and so does Debbie Downer for that matter. Do they have reason to be? That once again depends on whether or not the President has been talking to his Attorney General about this entire situation. If there was any reasonable chance that somebody would be coming to visit Clinton with an invitation to show up in court, wouldn’t the party be edging away from her by now? It just seems like you’d be seeing a lot more support for Bernie Sanders as the “safe” choice for this fall if they were really worried about it. With all of the news leaking out of the FBI and the various Inspectors General offices it certainly sounds as if the likelihood of an indictment would be at least 50-50 by now, so why take the chance on a candidate who might be immediately disqualified?

Every time I consider that question, however, a second one comes to mind. An indictment is not the same thing as a conviction and the process to get to that point could take many months if not years. Are we now such a partisan country that Hillary’s voters would show up and pull the lever for her anyway rather than seeing a Republican elected? Some Democrat insiders are already expressing glee at the prospect of a Trump nomination, predicting that it will turn out liberals in droves this November.

The Democrats should probably take a long, hard look at who she picks as her running mate. They might wind up in office sooner than expected.

]]>3898339DNC: On second thought, we’ll take that lobbyist and PAC money after allhttp://hotair.com/archives/2016/02/13/dnc-on-second-thought-well-take-that-lobbyist-and-pac-money-after-all/
http://hotair.com/archives/2016/02/13/dnc-on-second-thought-well-take-that-lobbyist-and-pac-money-after-all/#commentsSat, 13 Feb 2016 15:01:16 +0000http://hotair.com/?p=3893548During the 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama led the way in having the DNC change their rules to remove the corrosive influence of money in politics by having the Democratic National Committee reject contributions from lobbyists and PACs. This was seen in some circles as a refutation of the GOP and their big money donors, restoring some power to the grassroots. The health of the body politic was being tended to, citizens! Integrity was their watchword and the voices of the masses would be heard once more.

The Democratic National Committee has rolled back restrictions introduced by presidential candidate Barack Obama in 2008 that banned donations from federal lobbyists and political action committees.

The decision was viewed with disappointment Friday morning by good government activists who saw it as a step backward in the effort to limit special interest influence in Washington. Some suggested it could provide an advantage to Hillary Clinton’s fundraising efforts.

“It is a major step in the wrong direction,” said longtime reform advocate Fred Wertheimer. “And it is completely out of touch with the clear public rejection of the role of political money in Washington,” expressed during the 2016 campaign.

The change in the rules, already apparent to leading Washington lobbyists, was quietly introduced at some point during the past couple of months.

It was done “quietly” alright, but they weren’t leaving the choice to all of the potential, well moneyed financiers. Invitations have been going out to those who might wish to help out the DNC. (Not that you’ll get anything in exchange for your money, of course. Perish the thought.) As early as last summer, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz sent out invitations for people to donate to cover the costs of their convention, but now it’s expanded well beyond that. Three lobbyists told the WaPo off the record that they had already received “invitations” to donate directly to the DNC for all their political activities.

For the most part, they said, the DNC has returned to business as usual, pre-2008. The DNC has even named a finance director specifically for PAC donations who has recently emailed prospective donors to let them know that they can now contribute again, according to an email that was reviewed by The Washington Post.

This is being seen as yet another poke in the eye to Bernie Sanders and an effort to shore up Hillary Clinton’s prospects. There were joint fundraising committees set up in partnership between the DNC and each of the two remaining candidates’ campaigns. The one for Hillary Clinton has already raised $26.9M. But don’t worry, Bernie… they have a similar account for you! So far it’s taken in… one thousand dollars.

Between the debate schedules, the use of the DNC headquarters for the announcement of the Congressional Black Caucus endorsement of Clinton and the superdelegate situation, it’s become obvious that the DNC is so far in the tank for Hillary that they may drown in their own juices. (Oh, and Priorities USA Action just unleashed another $5M in attack ads against Sanders, even though that money was supposed to be held for the general election.) This new layer of massive funding support just adds insult to injury. But the DNC had best hope that their chosen messiah doesn’t wind up in the hoosegow before the convention. They may wind up damaging Bernie Sanders so badly that he won’t remain viable as a runner up if she’s not available.